HTC gives up South Korea

HTC has seen its fortunes fade over the past year, after aseries of strategic and tactical blunders cost it market share and revenues. It fell behind Samsung in the Android pack and lost much of the crucial US smartphone market, despite the fact that HTC did register some growth in the fast-developing Asia-Pacific markets. On the other hand, in spite of the Customs ban in the US and weak sales in Europe, the One series somehow improved HTC’s performance in the past two quarters.

There was definitely need of a change in the scenario and as a result, in order to stem loses, the phone-maker has been laying off R&D staff and closing offices in underperforming markets. Brazil, the biggest and most dynamic telecom market in South America was one of the most important stores closed down.

More, HTC is expected to give up South Korea as well and close down all the offices existing here. This is equivalent to HTC throwing in the towel and admitting that it can’t compete with the local players and Apple. As far as the South Korean market, this is highly dominated by Samsung (almost 70% in fact) and the other two local players, LG and Pantech, owe sizable chunks of the market, while Apple made some unimpressive inroads with the iPhone 4S.